A human face for drone victims

9:29 PM,
Oct. 30, 2013

Written by

Dana Milbank
Columnist

From Washington, the drone-warfare program looks almost aseptic: Remote-controlled aircraft fire with precision on targets half a world away.

But on Tuesday, this anonymous form of warfare assumed a name and a face: that of 9-year-old Nibila ur Rehman, who, along with her father and older brother, came all the way from Pakistan's tribal region to talk about the drone strike that killed her grandmother a year ago.

"It was the day before Eid," said Nibila, a beautiful child with caramel eyes and a shy smile. Through an interpreter, she told her story to lawmakers, staff and reporters in a ...